an observing perspective
by stopthebus
Summary: Ever wonder what the story would be like from an uninvolved survivors point of view? How would that character react when a strange girl washes up on the island and he's sent to look over her? setting in mid-second season


an observing perspective

The sun stretches in the morning, her rose-colored fingers reaching towards the sky as if to catch the moon. It is a beautiful day on the beach, as usual. The setting is so ironically relaxing, giving the situation we were dumped in. Plane crashes on a gorgeous tropical island and we all survive – a miracle, no?

No.

We have seen no rescue boats, no rescue helicopters. No rescue at all. No one has come to find us since we crashed here over _one month_ ago. The rest of the passengers on flight 815 have made do with the situation, setting up makeshift houses. That guy Hurley even set up a golf course. Only two holes, but, man, it was worth it.

It seems as if we could set up some sort of civilization here. If it weren't for the polar bears, the mysterious underground hatches, and a group of cannibals called the "Others." On second thought, take out the polar bear and cannibal part. I think that redneck killed off one of the bears and, truthfully, we don't know anything about the others. I overheard Jack, the hero, talking to Hurley about an Other named Henry, though… From what I gather, it is more of a suspicion than a fact that he is one of them.

I tend to try to not get involved with the leaders of our group. They are always off somewhere, protecting something or discovering secrets about the island. I've talked with Eko about this church he wants to build, chatted with Hurley about our former lives, and played backgammon with Locke the Hunter, as we uninvolved survivors call him, and they seem to be pretty nice guys. All of the "leaders" do, I suppose, but they don't necessarily have time to hang out since Sayid told us about the Frenchwoman and the tail-end survivors joined our camp.

In any case, back to the sunrise.

I've got nothing better to do on this island but sleep and eat and read, so I always try to wake up before dawn and watch the sun. This morning, I am reading my careworn, ripped up copy of _The Odyssey_. The sun spreads her fingers across the horizon and I wait a couple seconds, watching the water light up under her golden glow.

And then the screaming starts.

It's Claire, the mother with the baby, shouting in her Australian accent and pointing out toward the sea. I lower my book and scowl over at her, though I doubt she notices me, though I'm not very hard to miss. Six foot with a mop of black hair and thick, framed glasses, dressed plainly like every other survivor on the beach. Claire keeps shouting something – I'm trying to block out the noise – and, soon enough, Charlie the rockstar comes rushing to her side, trying to calm her down. But she's still pointing off towards the sea and eventually she wakes up the whole damn camp.

I dog-ear the page of my book and get up creakily, my bones hurting from staying in that position for so long. I melt into a crowd of five people, all walking toward Claire and Charlie to see what the commotion is.

"You know what she's talking about, Steve?" Sawyer asks me, his head tilted in my direction.

"Steve's dead, you redneck."

"Oh. Sorry, Scott," he says before shouldering his way through the crowd to get a better view. Being on of the leaders (more or less, in his case), he always has to be in the center of attention.

"I'm not Scott, either…!" I call after him, but my words are drowned out by the shocked murmurs of people.

"There's someone out there!", "Look! Towards the water!", "Someone's floating out there! They're getting closer!", "Somebody get the doctor!" people shout mindlessly, not thinking these things through.

Didn't we just explode open the door to an underground hatch? Didn't we just narrowly escape an attack from these "Others"? People in general are stupid and these survivors are no exception.

Word finally gets around and soon everyone in the camp is running about as if they have somewhere to go on this near-deserted island.

Jack and Kate are the only ones who keep a cool head, of course. He's shouting out orders to Kate (talking about medical supplies, probably) and he takes off his shirt and shoes, diving headfirst into the water, swimming off to be the hero.

I run towards the ocean along with a few others, stopping just before the water so I can get a good view without getting involved. There _is_ someone out there. A girl, by the looks of it. All I can see was a crumpled body, clinging weakly to a piece of long driftwood. The wood is shaped sturdily and has a skinny branch sticking off one side, but other than that, it is as plain and symmetrical as it could be. But there's something hanging from the branch. A black, box-like structure.

Another splash makes me look back at the water and I can catch the last glimpse of Sawyer as he dives under to swim after Jack as if this were a swimming competition. But Jack's already reached the girl by now and he swings her over his shoulder and begins swimming back to shore.

Everyone walks down the beach to get him but I stay in place, watching Sawyer carefully. Jack already has the girl so why is Sawyer still swimming? My mind lights up and I frown, letting out an annoyed sigh. He's after the briefcase hanging on the branch. That cocky, self-centered redneck, gathering supplies for his stash in order to blackmail us all.

"She's bleeding. Kate! Get me one of the thick bandages!" Jack calls out to her, the girl already laid out on the beach. He checks her breathing before he begins to extensively inspect her head wound. Like most people who spend extensive amounts of time underwater, she isn't breathing.

Jack begins pressing down on her chest, pausing to check her breathing every couple of seconds. I step towards the crowd just as Sawyer comes out of the water and walks behind us, going straight towards his tent undetected. That guy has some nerve.

A sick guttural sound snaps my head back to the girl and I am just in time to watch her sputter up seawater. Jack sits back on his feet, wipes his brow, takes the bandages from Kate, and presses them down on the girl's forehead.

"Um… Shouldn't she be waking up, dude?" Hurley asks from the crowd.

"She should," Jack says shortly, bending his head to see if she's still breathing. He peels apart her eyelids with his fingers and I flinch at the sight of her eerily-pale amber eyes staring blankly back. Jack lets go and sits up again, confused, "Her breath is shallow and her pupils are dilated, but she's still alive. Might be suffering from minor shock," he says, lifting up one of her wrists to look at her hand. "Her fingers are crinkled from the salty ocean, so my guess is that she's feeling a bit waterlogged." He drops her hand and stands up, putting both hands on his hips.

"We're not just going to leave her there, are we?" Charlie asks as some people begin to leave, no longer interested if she's not waking up.

"Charlie, you and…" Jack looks around, spots me and calls my name, "Clayton. Would you two mind carrying her to one of the empty tents? There's one by my tent. She can sleep there without being bothered," he says, walking back over to her.

"What about the hatch? We've got a bed down there, right? That way, we could keep watch over here, like, twenty-four-seven, right?" Charlie asks. I don't say anything, but watch Jack's expression closely. Considering what I heard before, the hatch might not be the best place to keep an unconscious girl, what with the Other in the armory.

He frowns, his dark eyes narrowing suspiciously. We're all too familiar with that look. "When she regains consciousness, it might not be the best thing for her to wake up in an underground hatch. She might feel more comfortable waking up here on the beach…" he says, but trails off. Charlie and I wait a few seconds longer, expecting more. Jack takes a deep breath and speaks again, "But we might want to have a guard watch over her…" He looks to me again and I sigh inwardly, "Clayton, do you want to take first shift?"  
When Jack asks you a question about if you can do something or not, he's usually looking for a yes. Everyone on the island is so predictable. After living with them for a couple of weeks, I know what to expect from them. And I guess they know what to expect from me, because I nod and accept his offer. "Sure. What could go wrong?"

Whenever you hear anyone say that, things always turn out badly.


End file.
